A/N: This story has been in the works for at least six months. I knew it was going to be a long one and so, I kept focusing on others I could finish sooner. But I kept going back to it and making notes and watching the episode repeatedly. Once "After the Breakup" was finished, it finally felt like time to tackle this one, as it is based off another season 7 episode.

S7E11: "Family Doctor" aired on 1/6/1991. This story supposes the Abruzzi family still pose a serious threat to Seth and Jessica. The first couple of short chapters explain the episode from Jessica's perspective and then veer off from there. Suspension of disbelief will likely be required on occasion. Fair warning.

Unlike my multi-chapter stories in the past, this story isn't complete yet. Currently, I am writing chapter seventeen.

Since it's not complete, I'm open to kind feedback or suggestions if you would like to see something included. I make no promises that I will use your suggestion. The bulk of the story is already written, and I have a general plan on how to end it. That said, as you will understand within the first few chapters, the story is long and could be longer if I want it to be. If you do have a suggestion, please leave it in a review or private message me.

Jessica is my muse, and I am happy to follow her lead. I don't own these characters or any "Murder, She Wrote" episodes, only my stories that I create. They make me happy.

Thank you to KarlieQ, who helped me talk through logistics.

Chapter 1

January 6

This day has turned into a nightmare. The weekend started out so wonderful, but now? Even though the immediate threat seems to be past, the fear lingers.

Seth and I traveled to Boston for the weekend to tour an art gallery and do a bit of antiquing. It had been a typical, cold, January day in New England. Bundled up in heavy winter coats, scarves, and gloves, we had a lovely time, despite the winter cold, first taking our time exploring the gallery, before walking around the Freedom Trail and Boston Common, as we window shopped and went into the occasional antique store.

Seth had offered me his arm as we meandered around the city. By late afternoon, we dropped off our packages at our hotel and went off in search of dinner.

We stopped at a payphone to reserve a table at Clams 'n Claws, Seth's favorite restaurant in Boston, planning to eat dinner before heading home to Cabot Cove. He regaled me with the ability to book a table at short notice, simply because he is a physician.

He had been thrilled to be proven correct, even though when we arrived, everything appeared to have changed. The restaurant had been bought out and the maître 'd was no longer Ernest Stagpool, much to Seth's dismay. Even his favorite server, Gus, was gone. Seth bemoaned the loss of the seventy-five years of history, as he does anytime something he loves changes with the times. I did my best to cajole and convince him to give it a try though. After all, it's still called by the same name. They were clearly trying to keep it how it had been previously, and the food smelled delicious.

But the problems begin soon after we order from the spoiled young woman who comes into the restaurant, followed by Seth being called away from the table in the middle of our meal. After waiting for forty minutes for him to return, I end up paying the tab, before going to ask the maître d' what has happened to him, only to discover that he doesn't know.

By now, I know something is seriously wrong. Seth wouldn't leave me, even in an emergency, without relaying a message. But if this maître d' is to be believed, Seth has vanished.

I do the only thing I can think of and that is to take a cab to the Boston police department to report Seth as missing. It is too soon for the police to do much. People often have to be gone for over forty-eight hours before an official missing person report can be done.

But I know Seth Hazlitt. As well as I know myself sometimes.

The first man I speak to is the type of man I encounter far too often. Dismissive and patronizing and questioning whether Seth has all his faculties. Thankfully, a lieutenant overhears us and intervenes, telling the sergeant to take the details down and to do so nicely.

The prior policeman is chagrined, yet not truly apologetic. He does what his superior demands though, to which I am grateful. After giving him the little information I have, the lieutenant offers to take me back to the restaurant to further question the maître d', as he was presumably the last person to see Seth.

To say that the maître d' was not accommodating or even honest, would be an understatement. It's clear that the man knows more than he is admitting and although the lieutenant attempts to gain information, the employee plays dumb.

Trying not to become irrational or despondent, I do my best to take in the details of the surrounding area where the private dining room was, as though this is a crime scene, because I am almost certain that it had been. When I notice the bleach stain on the carpet that was clearly masking blood, my own blood runs cold.

What has happened to Seth?

Thankfully, it isn't much longer before Seth is picked up by two policemen underneath a bridge where he had been dropped off in the cold like some piece of trash. They bring him to the precinct where the lieutenant and I are able to meet him and hear his story on the record.

Even wrapped in a blanket and drinking the hottest coffee the police could deliver, Seth is shivering. My anger rushes to the surface for how he has been treated, but I focus on the fact that he is safe now. All I want to do is wrap my arms around him to give him what bit of warmth my own body has, but I refrain, knowing it wouldn't be appropriate.

Seth and I don't have that kind of relationship. Even though I think I want one. We have simply never gone in that direction. I'm not really sure why, but I intend to mull it over at the soonest opportunity.

Hearing how Seth had been called upon to remove a bullet from a man's body in crude circumstances with only the help of minor anesthesia and a family member to assist, I am dumbstruck. Apparently, the family refused to allow the injured man to be taken to a hospital. The circumstances were not only strange; they were troubling. What kind of family would have a relative with a gunshot wound and not allow them to seek medical care in a hospital where they were better prepared to treat them? It seems heartless to make a loved one go through a traumatic medical crisis without the benefit of modern anesthesia and safe sterile conditions.

Getting my answer quicker than I thought, we are asked by the lieutenant if the name Carmine Abruzzi means anything to us. The notorious mobster? Apparently, the man with the bullet buried in his chest was the head of the family himself. The thought crosses my mind briefly, that it is a shame that Seth saved his life, as the Abruzzi family has been connected to many violent crimes over the years. I feel ashamed of my thoughts immediately though. No one deserves a violent death, even someone who was likely responsible for the death of many others. Besides, Seth is a physician and anyone who dies under his care causes pain to his soul. Knowing how deeply such a loss hurts him, I would never wish that.

Instead, we are warned that depending on the outcome of this situation, Seth and I could be forced into the witness protection program and sent to live somewhere remote such as Provo, Utah. For a brief flash, my mind leaps ahead into the future to what such a life would entail. Would we live together as friends in separate residences as we do in Cabot Cove? As soon as the thought crosses my mind, I know that would be far too suspicious. The only way they would send a man and woman to live together, would be as husband and wife. Especially to live in a remote area that probably does not have many newcomers.

Before I can even process what such a turn my life would take if happened, I realize that we are being taken back to our hotel for the night. The police told us they would speak to us again tomorrow, as they believe they will have more information by then, and I could see in their eyes they think we have more information to provide them.

More than anything else, I want to talk to Seth before we retire to our separate rooms, but when we walk into the elevator, the exhaustion is so evident on his face that I can't ask him. So instead, I say goodnight, kiss his cheek, and encourage him to rest.

"Ayuh, Jess, I think I will be out as soon as my head hits the pillow."

Needing assurance, I tell him, for my own benefit as much as his, "It will all be okay. We'll talk in the morning."

He nods, before using his key card to let himself into his room, located next to mine. Standing in the doorway of my hotel room, I watch as he closes his door. I'm surprised at the rush of emotions I feel when it clicks shut. My immediate reaction is that I want to bang on the door and beg him to let me sleep on his couch, terrified that he will disappear again. Alternatively, I want to sit and talk to him, asking him to recount every detail of the past evening, before he falls asleep. Certain that I won't sleep tonight, my brain is bound to work over each detail of this plight we are in, trying to understand what has happened.

The irrational part of me wishes that we could go to the airport and take the first flight to Portland, so that we could go home to Cabot Cove this instant. But this last idea is pure foolishness. If the Abruzzi family decides to track us, we would be sitting ducks in Cabot Cove.

I would never admit it, but I sometimes feel like a child when I'm scared. Feeling lonely and emotional, I want to crawl into bed and pull the covers over my head as though I am eight years old again.

However, I am a grown and rational woman, and I don't do any of the ideas that have raced into my mind. Rather, I do the only reasonable thing I have control over. I lock my door and go straight to bed, keeping my head above the covers.

But I do not sleep. I can't; a gnawing fear is creeping in.